Mardi | 2021-05-18
16H00 – Webinar

Gianfranco GIANFRATE

Executive ownership addresses agency problems by aligning the financial goals of management and shareholders. We explore whether executive ownership fosters non-financial sustainability footprint as well. We show that executive ownership and insider trading activities are negatively associated with firm environmental and social performance. A quasi-natural experiment shows that the inverse relationship between executive ownership and sustainability performance is causal. Our results suggest that ad hoc incentive mechanisms besides executive ownership should be introduced, in order to help businesses addressing effectively social and environmental issues.